


yours

by CanIHaveAHug



Category: Dream SMP - Fandom, Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Dream Team SMP Spoilers, Friendship, Gen, I keep changing the tags lmao, Light Angst, Morally Ambiguous Character, Open to Interpretation, Tubbo is Trying His Best, featuring:, not-a-complete-dick!Dream
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-08
Updated: 2020-12-08
Packaged: 2021-03-10 06:07:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,533
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27949559
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CanIHaveAHug/pseuds/CanIHaveAHug
Summary: Tubbo blinks. “A compass?”Wilbur gestures for him to pick it up.The compass’s nametag blinks up from his palm, and Tubbo’s stomach drops like stone.Your Tommy,it says kindly, achingly.
Relationships: Clay | Dream & Toby Smith | Tubbo, Toby Smith | Tubbo & TommyInnit, Toby Smith | Tubbo & Wilbur Soot
Comments: 12
Kudos: 384





	yours

**Author's Note:**

> yeah i know wilbur gave it to tubbo today in stream (12/7/20), leave me alone, i wrote this the night tommy was given his compass and haven't revised it :/  
> and if you think dream is majorly ooc-
> 
> um. you. might be right.  
> but i will ignore it.

“Tubbo! Tubbo, hey, hey, look! Look, I have a present for you!”

Tubbo turns around to see Ghostbur scampering into the room, a smile on his face and something hidden behind his back. “Oh… kay? What’s the occasion?”

Ghostbur laughs lightly, echoey and insubstantial. Tubbo has gotten over how creepy it is at this point. Mostly. 

“Wellll it wasn’t entirely for you, I just thought it was better to finish the set, you know? Because I was visiting Tommy, see-”

Tubbo’s bemused smile falters. 

“-and I kept thinking to myself, what would make Tommy happy, you know? Because he’s gotten so  _ sad  _ these days, Tubbo, it feels like he’s even more of a ghost than  _ I _ am really-”

The chair legs screech against the floor as Tubbo stands, gathering his paperwork in a mostly orderly fashion. “Wilbur, I appreciate the thought, but I need to get going soon, so I’m gonna need you to get to the point now.”

The shortness of his tone seems to startle the ghost, an odd look crossing his face, but it glosses over a moment later and he smiles again. 

Out of the corner of his eye, the ghost wanders over, and places something down at the edge of his desk with a gentle  _ clink. _

Tubbo blinks. “A compass?” 

Wilbur gestures for him to pick it up. 

The compass’s nametag blinks up from his palm, and Tubbo’s stomach drops like stone. 

_ Your Tommy _ , it says kindly, achingly. 

“I gave one to Tommy too, that points to you,” Ghostbur says, somewhere at his side. His presence is cold, but the words are so warm, gentle, and merciless like tugging plump petals from a stem of a flower. 

“...Ah,” Tubbo swallows, an iron bar twisting up his stomach. “Is… that what that lodestone you set up in the White House for?”

Wilbur hums in confirmation. 

Tubbo bites his lip. Takes a deep breath, and thinks of growing walls, a gleaming axe, a bone white mask. 

He turns, and makes his sternest face. “You shouldn’t have done that, Wilbur.” The ghost startles in the most childish way, a flicker of guilt arising in Tubbo’s chest at the look on his face. “He’s in  _ exile _ .” 

The slant of Ghostbur’s head, a downturn in his lips, makes the teenager hate himself. “But you make him happy, Tubbo!”

Despite the ghost’s most likely best intentions, the words are more like a hot iron poker stabbing Tubbo’s heart. “Tommy Innit is in  _ exile, _ and he- he’s  _ not allowed  _ back in L’Manberg _! _ ” His breath stutters. It hurts to continue, “You very well know how impulsive he is. You shouldn’t have made it easier for him.” 

There’s quiet. A suffocating, limitless silence, except for the scuff of Tubbo’s suddenly fumbling hands straightening papers and stationary that don’t need to be straightened. 

“You could visit him,” is the thoughtful rebuttal. 

“I… I’m not going to,” Tubbo mutters.  _ Even if I wanted to, Dream would… _ “That’s- I can’t-” 

Chilly, ghostly hands take up his own, folding his fingers back around the compass. When Tubbo flinches and looks up, it's into imploring, kind eyes. “Maybe not right now. But just… keep it around then, okay? For peace of mind.”

_ There is  _ **_nothing_ ** _ peaceful about what this does to my mind, _ Tubbo thinks with an edge of hysteria. But he nods, if only to get Ghostbur out of his sight. It works, and Tubbo is left with a painful squeeze in his throat, glowing metal in his hand, and an unwavering needle pointed to the friend he sacrificed for a nation. 

He imagines, unbidden, another compass, identical in all aspects of design except the tag, sitting in the palm of a boy hundreds of thousands of blocks away. 

He slips it into his pocket and tells himself he won't use it. 

\---

The lie lasts for twelve hours. 

At the end of the day, Tubbo sits back in his chair in the meeting hall, his associates long dismissed. A headache mounts at his temple, the anger from his councilmen still sticking needles into his skin. 

He couldn’t trust them. Not really. Not when they didn’t trust him in return. 

Which… in a certain point of view, was fair. He should’ve been more vocal about his doubts, shouldn’t have folded so easily to their pleas on the roof when he  _ knew,  _ from a clear, black and white flow chart in his brain,  _ exactly _ what the right choice was. He shouldn’t have let the situation get so far that he’d gone back on  _ his word _ to them. 

Though, he doesn't know if it would’ve changed anything. If they would’ve  _ let  _ Dream take Tommy away if he’d never agreed, no matter how reluctantly, to their reckless ideas. 

It’s a part of the flow chart he avoids following to its conclusion. 

Just as Tubbo finally rises from his seat, the burnished evening sun filtering in through the curtains and snaking across the table, a sharp double-tap echoes from the door. When Tubbo raises his eyes to greet the newcomer, his blood runs cold. 

“Dream.”

The masked man inclines his head, hands in his pocket. “President Tubbo.”

The boy clears his throat, folding his hands behind his back.  _ Do not fold if there’s a way out. You are not a doormat. You are a leader. _ Or he tries to be. “This is kinda a... surprise. How can I help you?”

The placid gaze of the mask bores into him, uncomfortably quiet. Tubbo forces his feet not to shuffle.

After a near endless moment, the Dream SMP owner pushes off the door frame and wanders over to the windows, his axe nowhere in sight but more than likely ready to be summoned in a moment’s notice. Tubbo suppresses a shiver as the man passes by. 

“I just heard Ghost Wilbur was handing out gifts early,” the man shrugs, posture neutral, almost friendly. “A compass, specifically.”

“A… compass. Yeah. that’s correct.”

Dream is quiet. Tubbo stares at his back, noticing for once that it was… unarmoured. 

He almost misses the thoughtful hum from in front of him, a short glare of reflective light cutting his eyes. “ _ ‘Your Tommy, _ ’ huh?” 

Tubbo inhales sharply, and it takes a frantic pat down his jacket for him to realize the compass had indeed escaped from his pockets and now sat idly in the man’s hand. 

“You…!” Tubbo cuts off the accusation, and as calmly as he can manage, he asks, “...give that back, please.” 

The masked man doesn’t respond, considering the small tool in his hand, the locating magic illuminating his gloves with a gentle glow. 

A thread of anger tightens around Tubbo’s throat, and he steps forward, hand still outstretched in a demand. “Dream, you  _ know _ I won’t use it, please, just give it back-!”

Suddenly the warrior turns on his heel, looming over Tubbo, and the boy stumbles back a step, heart skipping a beat. 

“You’re right, Tubbo,” Dream hums, tossing the compass up and down nonchalantly. “I  _ do  _ know. You wanna know how I know?”

“...How?” Tubbo asks, eyes riveted on the fragile glass and metal contraption tumbling through the air.

“I know because of three things. Firstly, you’re a logical thinker. You’re good at setting aside emotions and unreliable things like hope and luck for the good of your people. They don’t appreciate it, I think we both see that, but don’t worry, I do. 

“Second, you fear me. Rightfully so. And because of reason one, you also trust me to keep my word. 

“And third...” 

Tubbo fumbles, catching the compass just as it's tossed at his face, the hammering of his heart lessening for a single, merciful second as the name tag glows awake from the glass. 

The needle in the compass spins, settling to aim directly behind Tubbo. 

Dream’s words are deadly amused. “You care about  _ him  _ even more than you care for this nation.” 

(From where the compass is cradled close to his chest, Tubbo almost mistakes it for pointing straight at his heart.)

He bites his cheek. “That’s, uh… kinda counterintuitive logic, isn’t it?”

Dream chuckles. “Not at all.”

With a chill making its way down his back, Tubbo watches warily as the man strides past him, and he counts every step until the other leaves the room. 

Then the man pauses just by the door. “Tubbo.” 

“Uh- yeah?” the boy asks nervously. 

“People say I’ve pulled a lot of crap, but I want you to understand, there’s only one thing I’ve ever wanted, and it’s for this server to  _ thrive _ . Really, our goals don’t misalign that much, for all the people rag on us both.”

“...and?”

Dream turns to look back at Tubbo, one hand slipping off the mask just far enough to let one green eye peek out, more human than he’s allowed in years of bloodshed. “I’ve said it before. I  _ trust  _ you to make the right decisions. Both for yourself and others.”

Tubbo blinks at the idle, neutral tone, far from the edge of menace he expected. “Wh- huh?”

The mask slips back in place. “I don’t make people afraid to make them miserable,” he says.

“Bring plenty of food, if you go. It’s a long trip to and back.”

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading, now comment to feed me serotonin ples. i posted this instead of finishing my final essay 8)
> 
> Edit: ok listen, i say shit abt dream's characterization but if any of you guys actually understand what i was trying to get at w his cryptic logic here, i'll give you a high five.


End file.
